


Here All The Bombs Fade Away

by Nokomis



Category: Batman (Comics), DCU - Comicverse
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-23
Updated: 2011-12-23
Packaged: 2017-10-27 22:09:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,508
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/300583
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nokomis/pseuds/Nokomis
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bringing Jason back into the clan.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Here All The Bombs Fade Away

**Author's Note:**

> This fic ignores the DCnU.

Jason doesn’t say anything when he sees Tim, but he gives him a hard, long look that makes Tim shift uncomfortably in his new costume, leather creaking so quietly that only Jason and the blonde are close enough to hear it.

“So you need someone to get their hands dirty for you,” Jason says after another short stretch of silence, the kind that feels familiar, feels like Bruce, disapproving but needy at the same time.

“No,” says the little girl wearing the Batgirl costume. He knows Babs is talking in her ear, whispering to her the words to win him over, and he resents it. “We need someone that has the reputation of getting their hands dirty, and it just so happens you fit the bill.”

Jason rolls his eyes. “They’ll stick just anyone in that costume these days, won’t they?” he says confidentially to Tim, who purses his lips in an uncanny imitation of Bruce.

Blondie doesn’t give Tim a chance to reply. “Oh, sweetheart, no need to get jealous on my account. Get us through this and I’ll let you try it on.”

Maybe she isn’t as bland as he supposed. “Oh, pretty please with sugar on top?”

“Will you do it or not?” Tim interrupts, elbowing Blondie in a familiar, habitual way that causes Jason to revise a few assumptions about Timmy-boy.

“Why the hell not?” Jason says, because at the very least he’ll get to scandalize the kidlets by bashing a few heads in.

*

It doesn’t go entirely according to plan.

Jason finds out that his role is to burst in and bash heads, being his usual badass self while Tim and Blondie sneak around back and steal some disc containing super important information. Or something. Jason isn’t really interested in the down and dirty details.

So he goes in with guns blazing, yelling and scaring the holy shit out of a whole room full of Mafioso-wannabe motherfuckers. He only grazes a few, going mostly for flash and awe.

They initially scatter and then, sensing that it’s just the one of him, not a crowd of crazy-ass masks, start returning fire. That’s when things start to get awesome. Jason is actually enjoying himself, taking them out one by one, getting to plan out his maneuvers in his head as he picks and chooses his marks, when a cape swoops down in front of him.

For a second all he sees is jagged-edged cape and pointy ears, but he quickly realizes it’s Blondie. “Scoot,” he tells her, taking aim at one of the smattering of thugs who haven’t split or spilt blood.

She fucking winks at him, then announces in a grandly smug voice, “Gotta take you in, loser.”

Then Jason’s taking a boot to the face.

It’s embarrassing how he didn’t see it coming. Blondie doesn’t give him a second to recover his wits, just goes for a roundhouse punch that he avoids reflexively.

He recovers quickly and goes at her, and quickly realizes why she’s got a Bat on her (stellar) chest: she fights almost as dirty as he does. Definitely as dirty as he did when he was Robin. She’s all sharp lines and misdirection and cheap shots, and mixed in are moves that he knows didn’t come from any cape.

He’s better than she is, but she doesn’t let up, and it’s the most fun fight he’s had in ages. He thinks they’ve become the distraction, that whoever is secretly running this crime ring is now going to think that Red Hood lead a b-list Bat to his lair, and their fight is definitely fucking real, but there’s a playfulness to Blondie that he hadn’t counted on, and she obviously thinks that busting faces is as fun as he does.

They go crashing out of the warehouse, and there’s the metallic taste of blood in his mouth. She’s got a bloody nose – she’d seemed surprised, but of course a former Robin would know how to bust a nose inside a cowl – but her grin is sharper and brighter than ever.

She manages to trip him up using a fucking trash can lid, and then he’s suddenly staring up at the sky, blood in his mouth and Blondie on top of him. She leans in close and tucks something into his helmet, and then suddenly there’s a voice in his ear that he hasn’t heard in ages.

“Jason,” Babs says brusquely. “I couldn’t risk bugging you before we’d seen what was going down there. You’re going to escape from Batgirl now, the objective has been accomplished.”

Jason doesn’t reply, just knocks Blondie on her ass – a little regretfully, it’d been a while and she’d felt pretty fantastic on top of him – and takes off.

*

The next day a thank-you bouquet of flowers arrives at his apartment.

It’s good to see that Dick’s sense of humor hasn’t changed.

*

“Hey there, slugger.”

Jason does not jump. Fucking Blondie did not just sneak up on him. Not even Bruce could sneak up on him. He glares, feeling strangely naked without his helmet. His mask should be enough, but somehow isn’t.

Blondie grins and sits down on the rooftop’s ledge, spending a moment arranging her cape so that she can sit comfortably cross-legged, resting her elbows on her knees as she stares out at Gotham.

Jason sighs. She’s not going to just leave him alone. “They know you’re here?”

“What, I need permission?” She raises her eyebrow. Her face is still expressive through the cowl in a way that reminds him of Babs back when they were both whole.

“I’m the bad one,” he says. “Sweet little thing like you shouldn’t be hanging around me.”

She bursts into bright, surprised laughter. “You know, they all think we’re just alike.”

“They’re wrong,” he says, which just makes her smile wider. If anything, she’s a lot like Dick, and he can see why they keep her around.

“That’s what I said,” she replies. She pats the ledge beside her. “Come on, dead boy, take a load off.”

“I wouldn’t think you’d be making undead jokes,” he says, because he knows the Gotham grapevine, had vicariously made himself part of the Bats through it.

“Oh, but I was only mostly dead!” She waves a hand dismissively. He snorts despite himself. She pauses, like she wants to say something, and then plows ahead. “You know Damian, don’t you?”

Jason nods. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

Blondie rolls her eyes at him. “I don’t want you to blather on about how emo you are. That trend is seriously over, dude. I just want to know if he’s got any chance at, you know. Being deprogrammed. Because he’s a pretty horrible little psychopath and I don’t want them getting hurt.”

Jason knows she doesn’t mean physically, and for the first time realizes just how deep into this Blondie really is. “Talia’s crazy as fuck,” he says, “but she loves Bruce. That kid… he’s got potential.”

It’s probably the nicest thing he’s said in months. Blondie nods. “I keep picking on him. Kid needs some perspective.”

“I didn’t peg you for a bully,” Jason replies.

“That is because you don’t know me,” she replies. “Isn’t that right?”

The question is directed to the shadows on the other side of the roof, and Tim lets out an audible sigh and joins them, sitting on Jason’s other side. He feels surrounded, but it isn’t necessarily bad.

“You are a jerk,” Tim tells her. “You hit me with a brick that one time.”

“And yet, you still totally love me. I think that says more about you,” Blondie replies tartly, and Jason wants to laugh at the pair of them.

“You know that Bruce is coming back,” Tim says. It’s not a question, and Jason shrugs. He doesn’t think that Bruce’s life feels done, but he knows better than anyone that things don’t work like that.

“Tim found proof,” Blondie says. She pats him on the knee, like they’re friends or something. Only the hope paralyzing him keeps him from snapping at her, from getting up and leaving.

“Proof?” No one had found proof of Jason’s own resurrection, no one but Talia fucking al Ghul, but of course his replacement is scarily tenacious. Bruce wouldn’t have replaced him with anything less than someone guaranteed to make it.

Tim grins at him, probably the first genuine smile he’s ever seen from the kid, and says, “Wanna go to the cave? I’ll show you.”

Blondie nods. “Come on, it’ll piss everyone off. It’ll be fab.”

It’s just not in Jason’s blood to turn down an offer like that. “Is Babs still a fox?”

It’s Blondie who answers. “Totally.”

From Tim’s expression, Babs is saying something interesting, and Jason wishes he knew where she was watching from so he could blow her a kiss. He feels strange, disconnected and buoyant, and the knowledge that unmoored him bubbles hot through his veins: _Bruce is alive._

And maybe, just maybe, he’ll understand what Jason went through when he returns.


End file.
